Uttarakhand 225
cularly, among the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. There
is neither tradition nor much enthusiasm for education. One
reason for this lack of enthusiasm is that literacy has not been
functionally associated with the occupation; that is why even now
inspite of much emphasis on education, the villagers still keep
themselves away from education as a result of which the
average attendance in the schools and colleges is very low.
Another aspect of literacy is complete ignorance about the history,
culture, geography and other aspects of their homeland because
nothing has been done to incorporate their history, culture and
geography in the text books. This has been a Himalayan
blunder. The need of the hour is that following subjects are
included in the curriculum of the schools and colleges of Uttara-
khand because Universities of Kumaon and Garhwal have already
partially included these subjects in their syllabus. In order to
streamline educational system, it is imperative that following
subjects are included in a systematic manner in the curriculum
from the primary standard to university level, so that students
can know better the land to which they belong :
(i) Himalayan agriculture combined with horticulture and
vegetable growing.
(ii) Investigation and cultivation of medicinal plants in the
light of the Indian systems of medicine.
(iii) Animal husbandry combined with poultry farming.
(iv) Engineering in the context of irrigation and electric
generation.
(v) Himalayan geology with particular emphasis on minerology
and metallurgy.
(vi) Problems of hygiene, sanitation and public health.
(vii) Study of Himalayan architecture, sculpture and other fine:
arts.
(viii) Study of Himalayan phonetics.
(ix) Study of local geography, anthropology, botany, geology,,
chemistry etc. with particular reference to Himalayan conditions.
(x) Investigation and open up the study of the mysteries of
Himalayan history and culture.
(xi) Study of local folk art and dance-drama.
(xii) Forestry be included in the curriculum of schools and
colleges so that students get involved in the maintenance or